Massive f’in rat - in the back gardenette. It then had a fight with one of the resident squirrels. All residual bird food now removed and perusal of rat traps has commenced on Amazon. Cat has now appeared - it hasn’t a hope against that rat, as I am sure it understands, so presumably it regards the rat as just a Creature of Interest.

Massive f’in rat - in the back gardenette. It then had a fight with one of the resident squirrels. All residual bird food now removed and perusal of rat traps has commenced on Amazon. Cat has now appeared - it hasn’t a hope against that rat, as I am sure it understands, so presumably it regards the rat as just a Creature of Interest.

Worth checking out what your council does, regarding vermin?Mine came and laid poison.Maybe a landlord issue....Removing the bird food is probably a good idea.

Cheers Jurek. I see that Richmond Council uses SDK Environmental / Dial-a-pest and in their extensive ToC* I can see that if I go down that route, my bird feeders will have to go entirely. I’m a bit reluctant to do that but I might come round to it. I’d rather have my bird feeders + a dead rat. There is very little bird food on the ground. I’ll confess that Mr. Rat has only appeared since I started putting some seeds and nuts on the ground for those birds that don’t use the elevated feeders. This I have stopped as of today.

Also noted in the ToC: there are things called Glis Glis, and they are a right bloody nuisance.

We found a dead one right in front of the house last week. Folk with chickens round here put down poison, then the rats go and die where other folks' dogs can find them and get poisoned in turn. When I was a kid in Norn Iron we lost out family dog that way. Fortunately ours didn't find this one.

A bit happier: saw a Great Egret on my ride today. They touch down here to feed when they're migrating so this one won't be staying, but it'll probably be back next spring. Sometimes they'll stay a while - we had one a couple of years back that terrorized the local sticklebacks for a week.

We found a dead one right in front of the house last week. Folk with chickens round here put down poison, then the rats go and die where other folks' dogs can find them and get poisoned in turn. When I was a kid in Norn Iron we lost out family dog that way. Fortunately ours didn't find this one.

For that reason I really don’t want to involve any pest controller that is going to use poison. Presumably there is no way of preventing other animals being exposed to it.

The rat has not been seen since, as there has been no bird food on the ground. However, I feel the need to put out a trap. I can see where it lives: there is a gap between the back wall that runs along all the back gardens on the street and the end of the neighbour's extension. What is the best trap to get?

The rat has not been seen since, as there has been no bird food on the ground. However, I feel the need to put out a trap. I can see where it lives: there is a gap between the back wall that runs along all the back gardens on the street and the end of the neighbour's extension. What is the best trap to get?

As the rat has been seen a couple of times since the above, I tried this trap:

Result when using "rodent attractant" as bait: trap sprung, bait partially gone, no rat. Could have been slugs but doubt it.

Result when using my very popular "peanut wedged in cashew nut butter" recipe: suspiciously squirrel-sized holes have been chewed at each end of the outer box, trap has been sprung, bait eaten (twice). No rat. Trap in bin. In any case the last thing I want is to attract non-rats to the bait.

What I really need here is an air rifle but given that I don't have one, any suggestions?